Ink Review: NEW INK from Diamine: Oxford Blue

[Chrissy]

First of all I must apologise as this ink should have been launched at the same time as the other Diamine new colour: Classic Green, that The Good Captain launched in his excellent review.

However, due to me having been laid very low by a bacterial stomach infection, I'm late on parade with this review. Still, the show must go on, so I have written with this ink a few times and finally managed to get the review form done and scanned. So I'm back in bed with my trusty MacBook typing this.

As many of you will know, Oxford Blue has to be a dark blue. That is Oxford University's team colour, whereas Cambridge University's colour is light blue. This is a fabulous dark blue. When I wrote with it, I thought I knew of several dark blues that I could use as comparisons to it, but when I actually came to find similar colours, it wasn't as easy as I thought it would be. Oxford Blue is more blue than Montblanc JFK Navy Blue, and it's darker than Diamine Midnight. It's a well saturated really dark blue, with plenty of shading. I'm sure it will be a popular colour. I really like it. I'm not sure of the exact launch date, but it's not too far away.

• This isn't a waterproof ink, but it has good water resistance. The water was on the grid for about 1 minute before being swabbed and blotted by kitchen roll.

• Bearing in mind the paper I use is thick with a shiny, smooth surface, and I used a Lamy F and 1.1mm nib, this ink took 12-16 secs to dry.

• It flows very well and lubricates the nib very well. I saw no skips or hard starts despite leaving the pen uncapped while I did all of the swab tests.

• I'm not 100% sure yet if it will be part of the standard range, but I think it will. If it is, it will be available in 80ml glass bottles and 30ml plastic refill bottles

• Diamine sell it directly to end-users on their web-site.

Diamine Oxford Blue.jpg